While the political firestorm swirls and seethes with executive orders, lawsuits and deportations, leaders and volunteers with local immigrant-focused organizations are still doing the work of assisting people coming to the U.S. — albeit quietly, to avoid drawing the ire of federal and state officials.
For undocumented individuals seeking citizenship or asylum in the U.S., the fear is palpable, Pastor Dianne Garcia of Roca de Refugio said Tuesday between handing out diapers, clothing, water and snacks in the street to passersby near an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) check-in office near San Antonio International Airport.
“The administration is trying to create fear in the community of immigrants, but they’re also trying to create a sense of hopelessness and powerlessness for people who want to help,” Garcia said. “People are feeling like: ‘There’s nothing I can do.’ But there is definitely something you can do.”
She and five congregants set up a makeshift help desk out the back of her car parked down the street from the ICE office. A three-year old girl, fingertips covered in chip crumbs, wiggled into a gray hoodie that a volunteer fished out of the donated clothes bag. Her father balanced bottles of water on top of a large bag of diapers with one arm, leading his daughter to his car with the other.
“Gracias,” he said over his shoulder. “De nada,” Garcia replied.
Even if it’s a T shirt or a $10 donation, she said, “that matters. If you’re ready for the next step, come volunteer.”
One congregant held up a sign that read: “Jesus was an immigrant” to let the dozens of people waiting outside of the ICE office — many of whom were there for mandatory check-ins as part of legal asylum process — know the group empathizes with their journeys to and within the U.S.
“Their fear is that ICE will knock on their door, and we’re here coming to ICE … that’s a pretty powerful thing,” Garcia said.
A Nigerian immigrant, who asked to be identified, knows what’s like to have to trudge to ICE offices and immigration court. She said being able to help fellow migrants in the same way Garcia and others once helped her was “wonderful.”
“I, too, I was like that,” she said. “Almost every immigrant right now needs help, no matter how little it is.”
The simple act of talking to someone and being friendly, she added, “you release that tension.”
The work continues
Not all of the work is being widely promoted or publicized, given the risk of deportation raids, several people familiar with local initiatives said on the condition of anonymity.
“We don’t want a target on our backs,” they said.
One advocacy group is hosting a “know your rights” event in February, but the group is sharing further details by word of mouth rather than social media, an organizer said.
Catholic Charities’ legal arm Caritas Legal Services will be offering free legal consultation clinics from 9 a.m. to noon Feb. 22 to offer legal consultation on immigration, wills, deeds and guardianship plans for families facing deportation or separation.
The Migrant Resource Center, or Centro de Bienvenida, continues to provide temporary shelter and case management for legal asylum seekers, but the number of people staying and passing through there has drastically declined.
Outside the MRC on Wednesday, SAPD officers detained six people related to an investigation into the Tren de Aragua transnational criminal gang, the department said in a statement. Ultimately, two individuals were taken into custody by Homeland Security — because they had an arrest warrant and a deportation order — and the others were released, according to SAPD.
That incident led to false rumors online and throughout the community of a massive ICE raid at the MRC — fueling more fear.
The ecosystem of nonprofits and agencies that help migrants doesn’t currently have a centralized space or coalition managing efforts, Garcia said, but she is forming working groups with partners to get organized through the nonprofit she founded, Nuevos Vecinos.
“I really believe in the power of people working together and that we’re stronger together,” she said. “We have power if we join up and support one another.”
A country of immigrants
While the Trump administration’s deportation threats and executive orders have been so far aimed at Latino and Hispanic populations, all immigrants are at a higher risk, said Nadia Mavrakis, co-executive director of Culturingua.
“We all have to stick together,” said Mavrakis, whose organization typically serves Middle Eastern, North African and South Asian immigrants in San Antonio.
Different groups can take on different roles in the community, she said. There’s the in-the-moment emergency responses and the longer-term, community capacity building work.
Culturingua has positioned itself among the latter, with programs for youth development, affordable housing, policy advocacy and community engagement.
The nonprofit is planning monthly art and civic engagement events that focus on voter turnout and how to get involved in informing government decisions.
The goal, she said, is to “bring together people to talk about topics and issues that are important to them, but also use an art form so that people have a healthy way to express themselves.”
Culturingua is also part of the Pathways to Prosperity Coalition, which recently launched an Immigrant Women’s Entrepreneurship Program.
“We don’t want to let all of these [negative emotions] that we’ve been feeling the last week and a half overshadow the true spirit of what America is,” Mavrakis said. “We’re a country made up of immigrants and indigenous people.”
Until more clarity comes from the White House — or the courts — about how the administration’s directives will be carried out, Mavrakis, Garcia and other leaders said they’ll try to ignore the noise and continue their work.
“I just want there to be more empathy and compassion in the world, and I think we can be models of that,” Garcia said.
